In 1958, Charles David Keeling began making daily measurements of the concentration of atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) at the Mauna Loa Observatory on the Big Island of Hawaii. These measurements were begun as part of a one-year initiative, the International Geophysical Year, but because of Keeling’s persistence, the daily record has continued through the present, almost without interruption. The Mauna Loa record, now known as the Keeling Curve, continues to be collected under the direction of Keeling’s son, Ralph.

Last year, atmospheric carbon dioxide briefly crossed 400 parts per million for the first time in human history. However, it didn’t cross that threshold until mid-May. This year’s first 400 ppm reading came a full two months earlier this past week and the seeming inexorable upward march is likely to race past another milestone next month.

“We’re already seeing values over 400. Probably we’ll see values dwelling over 400 in April and May. It’s just a matter of time before it stays over 400 forever,” said Ralph Keeling in a blog post.

To preserve a livable planet, climate scientists tell us we must reduce the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere from its current level of 400 parts per million to below 350 ppm.

Right-wing Republicans remain unconcerned. Recently Congresswoman Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), the vice chair of the notoriously anti-climate change House Energy and Commerce Committee, said on “Meet the Press”: “Now, you know, when you look at the social cost of carbon, and there is a lot of ambiguity around that, what you also need to be doing is looking at the benefits of carbon and what that has on increased agricultural production.”

“The President should realize that Congress has taken action” on climate change policies, Blackburn said. “We have said no.”

Or perhaps the Cambrian when Life began, when CO2 concentrations were 15 times our current ppm. Despite this carbon life not only was created for it’s better part, but thrived to the greatest heights in biomass the world has ever known.

It is rather problematic for any life to thrive when the source of life itself is covered by 5 to 10 thousand feet of ice..common in glacial maximums, in all glacial epochs.

Don’t figure a little carbon is to do life in, heck carbon is what all life is made of.

If read, these threads demonstrate the periods of glaciation and global warming do not correspond to varying amounts of carbon. Worldwide glaciation has occurred in the context of CO2 ppm’s sixfold, even more, in the past.

It’s simple enough, CO2 is not the driver of climate change, even a child could make the deduction.

Every time it gets hot and warms up…life goes wild, and this increases CO2 concentrations what with the entirety of life’s excrement…

see. when the world goes into a glacial maximum, carbon dioxide levels drop very greatly, see..AS THERE IS NO LIFE ON A GLACIER! Not of any consequence.

Since we have only very recently come out of a glacial maximum, 13k years ago, it stands to reason as in all other cases of glaciation, that CO2 levels raise as life takes hold of the open space again. Warm is good knotheaded AGW human fear mongers.

Reviewing what geologists know about our past and seeing that carbon concentrations do not bear out as greater warming causation, it may well be that CO2 is a lagging indicator of warming, and that by the time it goes up, you are already well into the cycle that rises CO2 concentrations.

Something else is at work here. Should be looked into. Or not..for if it is true that Earth creates the CO2 concentrations, then there is not a whole lot humans are going to do about it.

Once again, you are confusing geologic time scales with the much more rapid time scale of global warming over the last century. And you are ignoring the impacts of climate change, such as rising sea levels.

That is nonsense, and there is no ignoring the effects of climate change. Sea level rose 425 feet in 13k post the last glacial maximum, much of it traumatic. There we’re no known human inputs during this time frame of any significance.

Climate changes seen in sedimentary petrology describe changes that happened in less than 1000 years. Sounds about right for what we are going through.

You again in ignorance deny the reality of mass global melt off far exceeding anything we have seen in human recorded history that happened time and again in the last 13k years that happened on scales within the time of a human lifespan.

Lake Agazziz comes to mind, go look it up.

As it stands you seem to repeating easily disprovable rubbish foisted upon the media by AGW alarmists.

As well, the Earth experienced worldwide glaciation even when the CO2 PPM were 15 times what they are now.

This event occurred in the Cambrian and is quite new in it’s challenge to AGW junk science. The fact that there was a glaciation which made the Earth into a veritable ice ball when CO2 level were sky high surely puts a torpedo into the idea that CO2 is responsible for warming…or I guess CO2 causes the ice ages if you are some kind of dummy and keep on insisting on the idea despite real evidence which completely contradicts AGW modeling.

Or yeah that’s it…CO2 concentrations warmed the Earth up so much it caused an ice age that turned the Earth into a veritable ice ball.

Do your own work, what I have described is common knowledge for any geologist with a BS degree.

Jesus Christmas! obama has won a Nobel prize so the value of it today is rather dubious.

The source describing the worldwide glaciation during the Cambrian which occurred with 15 times the CO2 concentrations of today are in the links I provided above, which you either deny, don’t understand, or simply didn’t read.

Look up Lake Agazziz. The Lake which was thousands of feet deep in places extended from The West Coast and as far as Michigan where beaches from its existence have been found. since you must be taught and will not do your own work..here you go.

No ones denies we had a little ice age. But that is not an argument against AGW and no decent geologist with a BS degree would accept your argument.

“Looking at the past gives us insight into how our climate responds to such forcings. Using ice cores, for instance, we can work out past temperature changes, the level of solar activity, and the amount of greenhouse gases and volcanic dust in the atmosphere. Looking at many different periods and timescales including many thousands of years ago we’ve learned that when the Earth gains heat, glaciers and sea ice melt resulting in a positive feedbacks that amplify the warming. There are other positive feedbacks as well and this is why the planet has experienced such dramatic changes in temperature in the past.”

In summary the past reveals our climate is sensitive to small changes in heat.

We can officially stop wondering if there is a “consensus” on global warming among scientists. A new study by James Lawrence Powell found only a single dissenter out of 9,136 authors who denied that global warming was man-made. Powell looked at more than 2,000 studies published in peer-reviewed journals from November 2012 through December 2013 and came up with just one that didn’t believe in man-made global warming.

Then why is it the entirety of AGW junk science is on its lips convincing no one?

Aside from the actual fraud of cooking the numbers IPCC is so incompetent that no one is paying any attention anymore.

Rick Perry governs about the only state in the union that pays its bill but what would nuclear waste dump noload Utah know about that?

Let’s face it, this thread is only there to cover the asinine embarrassment of a president acting as a dictator and spreading war and chaos not only with his mouth, but with nazi derived terror weapons.

Global warming is about to happen if we don’t throw this evil bastard out of the White House, he is sponsoring terrorists all over the world. The global warming I speak of is of the thermonuclear variety. That’s the one you probably should spend some time on.

The cabal in the US completely opposite of reality nazi style propaganda is going to start some serious fireworks ifit is not stopped.

Then why is it the entirety of AGW junk science is on its lips convincing no one?

Aside from the actual fraud of cooking the numbers IPCC is so incompetent that no one is paying any attention anymore.

Rick Perry governs about the only state in the union that pays its bill but what would nuclear waste dump noload Utah know about that?

Let’s face it, this thread is only there to cover the asinine embarrassment of a president acting as a dictator and spreading war and chaos not only with his mouth, but with nazi derived terror weapons.

Global warming is about to happen if we don’t throw this evil bastard out of the White House, he is sponsoring terrorists all over the world. The global warming I speak of is of the thermonuclear variety. That’s the one you probably should spend some time on.

The cabal in the US completely opposite of reality in its statements, built on nazi style propaganda. It is going to start some serious fireworks if it is not stopped.

Some posts doubled, others censored, some don’t show up and are called duplicates. This is some kind of POS site.

“Which of the following statements reflects your view of when the effects of global warming will begin to happen? They have already begun to happen. They will start happening within a few years. They will start happening within your lifetime. They will not happen within your lifetime, but they will affect future generations. OR, They will never happen.”

Already happening 54%
Within a few years 3%
Within your lifetime 8%
Future generations 16%
Never 18%

“And from what you have heard or read, do you believe increases in the Earth’s temperature over the last century are due more to the effects of pollution from human activities, or natural changes in the environment that are not due to human activities?”

You might expect the biggest lease owner in Canada’s oil sands, or tar sands, to be one of the international oil giants, like Exxon Mobil or Royal Dutch Shell. But that isn’t the case. The biggest lease holder in the northern Alberta oil sands is a subsidiary of Koch Industries, the privately-owned cornerstone of the fortune of conservative Koch brothers Charles and David.

The Koch Industries subsidiary holds leases on 1.1 million acres — an area nearly the size of Delaware — in the oil sands region of Alberta, Canada, according to an activist group that studied Alberta provincial records.

That the polls are so diametrically opposed is the clue that the issue is dead and buried.

You are some kind or moron or something Richard? It’s up there is the links you don’t read. The Forbes article.

The crown and whoever it has licensed holds the rest cav.

They will be digging it up, those tar sands and if the US does not approve the Keystone pipeline, then Canadians will build a pipeline for the oil and gas to the BC coast so the oil and gas can be run to whatever the entrepot they create, and sold to China.

Be best not to cut off your nose to spite your face progressive Muricah.

Richard, you make no sense, the Forbes poll is legitimate, and there is no consensus scientifically on why the world has warmed up.

Which it has not for the last 17 years using the IPCC, and NOAA data.

Did you take any science classes? You don’t seem to have any command of basic scientific principles, and fall to political follow the leader principles at the drop of a hat.

There is just piles of written historical evidence of climate change to read anytime one wishes within a human lifespan, while humans have been around. The warming period between 1000-1200 saw Vikings farming in Greenland and vineyards in Scotland, places where no such thing exists today, and this at a time when man’s carbon inputs into the atmosphere were minimal.

These climate “scientists” have no explanation for this warming yet they would bandwagon up to describe a period of warming far less intense as due to actions of man. That makes no sense.

As for Keystone you have to be about the most clueless person as to the reality of oil transport from the tar sands and ND, and surrounding fields.

The very same that Keystone would accomplish is currently being borne by truck and train, a totally unsafe and asinine way to roll. By denying Keystone, this then is de facto what you support, derailments, explosions, and dead drivers and anyone else in the way.

I hope to God we get some people in power who quit playing games, and start running this country in an adult manner. That would also require your mindset be pilloried and tossed out for its entire lack of common sense.

The Forbes headline, “Survey Finds Majority Of Scientists Skeptical Of Global Warming Crisis,” is what we in the reality-based community call a counter-factual argument.

How did the authors of this so-called survey achieve a result that they wanted? Simple. They cherry-picked “1077 professional engineers and geoscientists.” Not climate scientists, and there is no breakdown by where they work but I wouldn’t be surprised to learn they’re in the energy business.

There is an overwhelming and long-standing consensus among scientists who have studied global warming. It’s a fact.

The “no global warming for 17 years” lie is another counter-factual. Global warming, unfortunately, has not stopped. The 10 warmest years globally have all been within the last 16 years. NOAA National Climatic Data Center.

The Keystone XL pipeline and others like it offer no benefits at all for the average American, yet you seem desperate to see it get built. Did you bet money on it or something?

The reference was to the inane idea that this oil isn’t already flowing utilizing 19th century technology..the pipeline takes the rolling stock out of the picture, you know, the angle that Buffet bought in it’s entirety.

Plenty of trucking firms and railways don’t want the pipeline because that business will be gone. Keeping us in this defective transport paradigm in plain bad public policy.

There are many compelling arguments against the fatalistic assertion that the tar sands will be fully exploited regardless of the Keystone XL pipeline. Other proposed pipelines also face substantial opposition in Canada and other regions of the United States. Further, increased costs associated with alternatives such as rail make it clear that the Keystone XL pipeline is far and away the industry’s first choice, and industry experts have been the first to admit this.

You aren’t going to convince anyone with that thrice baked data, or any terminology that supporters of failed modeling like to use.

The world has warmed with the lifespans of man long before any carbon rise, it’s been written down in history, and there is no “scientific” explanation that jives with AGW junk science.

This conversation has little point, as the bandwagon has lost a wheel, (IPCC fraud) and its horses are out of feed. (government grants) The world has been warming up, then it isn’t, then it is cooling (little ice age) and in these events no carbon is involved. It would be a requirement to know how these changes occurred before going off half cocked with AGW based on man made CO2 now.

Which is why no one is listening.

You can quote polls, cooked data, whatever you wish, but this the reality.

The building of the pipeline is simple common sense, the oil from these production regions is already YEARS in being transported south..just by truck and rail.

Guess you haven’t been keeping track of the spills from trucks, the dead drivers, and the never ending amounts of oil lost in moving it from well to truck and then to rail, sometimes multiple times. Don’t forget the train explosions which um…actually kill people.

And I, as would many others, honestly believe the piecemeal destruction of Delaware sized parcels, be they in Alberta, Canada, the Amazon, or the Book Cliffs, will eventually and inevitably lead to the ruination of just what it is that actually sustains most life – certainly Human life.

A different way needs to be developed or a massive die-off will spread across the table. If we play our cards right, adapt to the realities and rediscover our absolute need to over-ride the neo-robber barrons, destructive path, we will then be able to afford them a role in the perpetuating, scenarios…if they behave.

Supporters of the Keystone XL pipeline say it will create jobs: 35 of them. The same right-wing Republicans who destroyed American livelihoods with Bush’s Great Recession, the sequester, austerity, and the government shutdown now claim they want to ruin the planet for 35 jobs!

Using industry analysis of carbon emissions from current tar sands production, the report says the pipeline will carry and emit 181 million metric tons of CO2 every year. That’s more than 37.7 million cars or 51 coal plants.

NASA scientist James Hansen famously warned that if the Keystone XL pipeline gets built, it’s “game over” for the climate. Remember, it’s not just one – there are more pipelines in the pipeline, so to speak!

The government shutdown was real. Austerity budgeting is real. The brewski counter-factual theory is that President Obama is sabotaging the economy… because he wants his administration to look incompetent?

glenn and brewski should be introduced to each other. Their collaborative writings would be the equivalent of Lennon and McCartney, but darker, monotonous and stupid.

They both know they’re helping to destroy honest conversations, but, I guess, they think that’s funny. I think they both have too much money. We should take it from them, and distribute it to the 3.5 (plus) billion people they stole it from.

Yet all of you sit on your asses burning that very fuel. Maybe go sit out in your driveway with a notebook, fold your thoughts into paper airplanes, and toss them to the four winds..see who reads them. Bring a blanky.

Like here, I would bet the bulk of your drivel would be swept up by the sweeper truck or wind up on a fence someplace like any other worthless tumbleweed.

It’s about time to pick up stakes and take the scummy carnival to the next town, before the natives figure it all out, find you liars, and tar and feather them.

Dreamers…the tar sands oil will burned up no matter how it gets to market. That is reality. If you don’t like it take it up with Canada. I mean clueless isn’t enough of a description for you all. Who cares about jobs? It’s the reduction of unsafe rolling stock and spills we are trying to avoid here.

Oh yes you can because the world warms up on it’s own, I have completely demonstrated that within the time span of man and a human life.

The FRAUD is in blaming man made CO2, and creating via scientific deception, deletion, and FRAUD that encompassed climate gate, the false reasoning and phony conclusions. what should happen is tha Hansen should be beaten with hockey stick, probably a Canadian one for good measure.

God, it simply defies description, I get more out of discussions with children, at least they have receptivity. It’s has to be the military training, then the guilt, then the turn, then dwelling in the opposite delusion. Crazy stuff you have.

In addition, the only lesson you will teach Canada is to realize the US is now gone bone stupid, and that running a pipeline over the Alberta and BC mountains to the Sea will be necessary in order to then build a receiving station whereby supertankers will take their oil from the Oil Sands, as they refer to them, to whosoever would buy it.

Most likely China.

….but maybe you and the current asshole in the White House can come up with a plan to create a coup in Canada, like in the Ukraine, Syria, Libya…Iran in ’53.

Or if that doesn’t work take your dumbass military training and mentality, bomb and then invade Canada with the goon squad you served.

As Rachel Maddow somewhat courageously pointed out last night. there is nothing to report regarding Malaysia Airlines Flight 370. Satellite photos of unknown objects floating in the Indian Ocean do not count as “breaking news.”

But conspiracy theories are always welcome on this blog, if only because they are fun to debunk. The missing flight was nowhere near Diego Garcia (which is about two rings east of the satellite location on the map below). Perth, Australia, is thousands of miles closer, which is why the search planes are based there.

Possible last known locations of MH370 in red, based on final satellite ping at 08:11 Malaysia time.

Only one of the many critical part assemblies off 777 needs to be retrofitted for the mission, When it becomes part of the maintenance stream who cares where the rest of the plane or its passengers went.